


throw my ticket out the window

by saltstreets



Category: The Pacific - Fandom
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2018-03-08 20:32:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3222509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltstreets/pseuds/saltstreets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Hillbilly's dead."</p>
            </blockquote>





	throw my ticket out the window

**Author's Note:**

> Written in late 2011, ~never before published~
> 
> This story is based off of the dramatised characters depicted in Tom Hanks' miniseries The Pacific. No disrespect at all is intended to the actual veterans upon which said characters are based.
> 
> Title from Bob Dylan.

Hillbilly was lying on the stretcher, eyes closed, the same worried lines across his forehead as they had been in life.

 

"Eddie."

 

Andy waited for a stirring, and groan, a sign that Eddie was maybe in pain but alive, alive alive

 

"Eddie."

 

Nothing. The stretcher bearers looked at him with blank eyes. Andy had seen that look before, on men who had seen too many of their buddies die to care anymore.

He wondered if his eyes looked like that.

 

"I'm sorry sir. He got hit real bad. He's been gone awhile."

 

Andy was silent, trying to wrap his head around the concept.

Abruptly, he pulled the canvas over Eddie's head, unable to look at him anymore, afraid of convincing himself that Eddie was only sleeping.

 

"Ack Ack." Burgin was standing there, waiting.

"...take him behind the lines. Make sure nothin’ gets at him."

Burgin nodded. He reached down and tugged Eddie's dog tags off from around his neck. "You want these, sir?"

Andy hesitated only a split second before silently taking the tags. He slipped them into his shirt pocket, feeling the hot metal burn through the worn-thin fabric.

 

"What's happened?" came a yell from behind them.

"Hillbilly's dead," Burgin shouted back, glancing out of the corner of his eye at Andy.

There was a buzz of mutters from the Marines and a scattering of curses.

 

Andy looked up, suddenly. "Keep your head down, Hillbilly," he said, clearly. Burgin looked down to where he sat, worry in his eyes. "Sir?"

"That's the last thing I said to him. 'Keep your head down, Hillbilly'." He was quiet a moment before grinning suddenly, startlingly. "Don't worry, Burgie, I'm not losing my mind. Just not using it a whole lot."

Burgin nodded, not convinced of his commander's mental health quite yet. “Sir.”

"I'll be alright. Let's go."

 

Two days later, Andrew Haldane stood up a little higher than perhaps he should of, than perhaps was safe, and took a bullet straight to the head.

 

Burgin dragged himself down to the men. "Ack Ack's dead," he told them.


End file.
